In-kind transfer from EJ to Vanguard and AA question

[nick_mmm]

My situation:
30 year old
80K salary, ~40% savings rate
$20K 401K (Vanguard target date 2055)
$55K taxable / td ameritrade (VTI/IEFA/BND/small amount of stocks).

 I also have two accounts with Edward Jones that I would like to move to Vanguard:
1. $28K - Taxable:
(2.5% commission on transaction)
6K ETFs
16K Mutual Funds (high load of course)
5.5K Stocks

2. $53K - Roth IRA:
(1% annual fee; no fee for transactions)
28K - Stocks
24K - Mutual Funds

My plan for the taxable account is to transfer everything in kind to Vanguard; and liquidate most of the holdings at Vanguard (a few of the stocks/mutual funds have sizeable gains and decent performance).

For the Roth IRA-  Since I pay no transaction fees at EJ; I am going to request my advisor sell all holdings prior to in-kind transfer.

Anything else I should be aware of?  Is it just a matter of contacting EJ advisor; requesting the sales; then opening two Vanguard accounts and starting the in-kind transfer of both accounts online through Vanguard?

I am struggling a bit with AA. Currently I am about 58% US equity, 34% International equity, and 7% US Bond. Does that make sense long term to continue that ratio?

[nereo]

Anything else I should be aware of?  Is it just a matter of contacting EJ advisor; requesting the sales; then opening two Vanguard accounts and starting the in-kind transfer of both accounts online through Vanguard?

I am struggling a bit with AA. Currently I am about 58% US equity, 34% International equity, and 7% US Bond. Does that make sense long term to continue that ratio?

Personally I would start with Vanguard and have them initiate the transfer.  For larger accounts (I think it is >$20k) you will need to get a medalian signature. You shouldn't need to deal with EJ at all if you go through Vanguard - they will open a brokerage account for you and transfer everything with a few signatures.  Just be aware that for whatever reason it can take Vanguard several weeks to complete everything.
 IME EJ will fight to keep you as a client, and they are also a horrible firm to do business with.

AA is a very personal thing.  Given teh overlap that large US corps have internationally (the top US firms already do >50% of their business abroad) you may have a  lot more invested internationally than you think.  Are your US holdings SP500? Total market?
For long-term investors with higher risk tolerances the usual recommendation is to have 10-20% in bonds, though some do 100% equities.  Your call.

[primozaj]

I did a move from EJ to Vanguard in late 2015 or early 2016.  I was using a managed account (Roth IRA) so I also was not going to pay fees for sale of assets.

So, I called my EJ guy and had the managed option "turned off" and had all funds sold so that I would just have cash...  At that point I had Vanguard initiate the transfer.  Keep in mind that EJ will look at that as closing the account and will hold some cash to pay the fee for "closing the account."  I considered this the cost of doing business and ultimately saving money in fees.

As for AA, depending on what you want to do with your accounts at Vanguard they may give you recommendations.  Outside of that I've heard that Weathfront will build an allocation for you even if you don't sign up to invest with them.  I can't confirm that but its just what I've heard through podcasts and the like.

For your taxable account you should check what kind of load they have (front or back).  EJ may not charge you anything to close them if they were front loaded... so that may be an option to have cash in the transfer.  Either way open the accounts with Vanguard first and tell them what you want to do, they may have advice as well.

As for Nereo's comments... I did get the EJ advisor trying to keep me initially... but not all that hard.  He offered to reduce my fees (not eliminate them) but once Vanguard initiated the transfer I didn't hear a peep from him.